Fugitives
by Elin B
Summary: Brook-centric piece: Brook is haunted by a memory from his long years of loneliness that has just resurfaced. Spoilers up to and including chapter 513. Some swearing and dark themes.


**AUTHOR'S NOTES:** I've written a Brook-centric fic from his POV for the very first time. I'm afraid the fic just ballooned, despite being rather limited in action and characters. It turned out **much** longer than I'd thought. Concrit extremely appreciated.

**RATING & WARNING:** Rated T for some dark themes and swearing. Mentions severe mistreatment and endangerment of children.  
**  
SPOILERS/SETTING:** Set after Sabaõdy: spoilers up to and including chapter 513. **However**, I'm afraid the framing story in this fic is set in a rather generic background rather than being canon-compliant with the hints we've got of Brook's post-513 adventures. I haven't seen the recent anime episode on the matter, and the brief manga hints seemed so... well, dramatic. I needed something calmer.

The flashback is set at an indefinite time in Brook's past.

**DISCLAIMER:** The characters and situations of One Piece belong to their extremely gifted creator, Eiichiro Oda. They are used here without permission for entertainment purposes only. This fic may not be used for profit.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

**Fugitives**

A One Piece fanfic by Elin B

There are times when Brook comes to wonder if Master Luffy happened to sprinkle some invisible magic dust on him at some point, when he joined the Strawhats. How else can he explain how the reactions he's been accustomed to upon first meeting new people have changed so much?

Oh, there are still those who cry in fear and run away when they see him, both young and old. But now, there are also people who hardly bat an eyelid; others who are startled and bewildered at first but soon settle down; some who get frightfully curious; and others who are convinced it must be a trick of some kind. And it didn't use to be like that.

One of those who do not flinch and run away from him is sitting across from him now on a bench in the village square, with a look of solemn concentration on her face. It's a child of perhaps four or five years old. Holding the fingers on his right hand, she's in the process of grasping that she and Brook really do have just as many fingers, no matter how much longer, thinner and bonier his are.

She's murmuring some finger-rhyme Brook doesn't know, looking from her own short round fingers to Brook's, frowning. Her grandmother is sitting on a porch not far away, smoking a pipe and occasionally looking over at them indulgently. The child's older brother and his friends are sneaking around the village playing some secret game of their own, every now and then passing by the village square.

Some of those children still won't get close to Brook and will duck away if he looks at them, while others are much bolder, requesting songs or wanting to know all about skeletons. Children are all different, as much as grown-ups are. Brook knows that, of course; but it may be that he hasn't remembered it for a long time.

He's thinking idly of this and that, wondering what he might be served for dinner, if the carpenters of the village have made any progress on the boat they've promised him, enjoying the feel of the mild autumn sun on his bones, all the while humming in tune to little Miss Liza's rhyme...

Then, all of a sudden, out from a cobwebbed corner of his mind the fragment of a memory turns up in his head, as clear as day. He flinches, and if he could get any paler he would.

"Ah – pray excuse me, Miss Liza, I, well, I do believe I shall need those fingers," he says to the child, gently loosening her grasp and hastily grabbing his violin. His fingers have already started to tremble once he raises the bow, which was his real reason for letting go, so she won't notice and be too frightened.

The violin calms him down somewhat. After some aimless false starts, he starts to play, but not sing, the long-winded ballad "Where The Sea Roses Grow." It's mostly just to keep his hands busy while his mind is still scrabbling, trying hard to sort things out. To remember it properly, now.

**x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x**

It was, what? Thirty years ago, ten, fifteen? It was long before he first ran into Thriller Bark and lost his shadow, he's sure of that much, but as for the rest… impossible to say, by now.

He'd been sitting by the railing, lost in a reverie of his days as a bodyguard at a royal court in West Blue. He was just trying to recall old fencing duels and what their outcome had been, when there were suddenly distinct sounds of splashing in the water, over by the starboard side. And then, from the same direction, he could hear two voices, talking fairly quietly.

After a startled high jump, Brook went to pick up his sword cane, legs shaking, then walked over as far to starboard as he could without getting seen, doing his best to still himself and listening. But the ghost of his heart was thumping wildly in his chest.

"C'mon, Kili!" one of the voices said. It sounded young, tired and strained. "Don't give up now! They'll be coming closer."

"But..." gasped the other voice, sounding even younger and more exhausted. "...We've swum so far... Are you sure they could..."

"I... I think they got the shark-boat repaired," said the slightly older voice in a loud whisper that Brook had no trouble catching. "That's fast as hell... And those octopuses they got workin' for them can swim just as far down as we can."

The younger voice swore. Was that tears in it, too? "D-dammit! Tiger says fishes shouldn't be listenin' to no-good humans! They should be doin' what _we_ say!"

There was the sound of someone getting smacked, and a lower, more insistent whisper. "Don't talk about Tiger like that where others can hear! That's secret stuff!"

"B-but there's no one around..." said the younger voice, sounding scared and sulky.

"We don't know that yet," muttered the older voice – and how true that was! thought Brook, nodding to himself up on deck. "C'mon, we've rested now. The seaweed over here looks good for climbing."

There were sounds of movement, and the creaking of old seaweed and dried wood. Hearing the sounds approaching up the side of the ship, Brook stepped back behind the foremast, peeking through one of the rags hanging down from what used to be the sail.

"This ship looks so creepy," mumbled the younger voice.

"Don't bother about that!" snapped the older one. "It ain't like we got a choice!"

And then, the next thing Brook knew, there were two heads peeping over the railing. Two boys, the older maybe around ten, eleven, twelve; the younger looking like eight or nine. They looked around the old wreck of a ship, then warily, quietly, climbed over the railing. They were not human.

He'd only ever seen grown fishmen and the odd fishwoman before. Would you call these fishboys? he wondered. Brook was no ichthyologist, but he thought the older one seemed rather halibutlike, the other maybe more like a puffer-fish, or some species he didn't know.

Both of them were skinny, their eyes big and sunken-in. Their dripping wet clothes were dirty and torn, and they had plenty of bruises and scratches – there were marks around the wrists and ankles, as if they'd worn chains.

(Looking back on the memory now, Brook feels relieved he can't recall them wearing those awful collars that had put Miss Caimie in so much trouble back at Sabaõdy archipelago. Not that he'd known what to look for, back then – but surely those things were conspicuous enough for him to have noticed, even back then? He would like to think so, at least.)

They also both wore clumsy-looking bandages, the older one on the fin on top of his head, and the younger one on his left arm – oh, my! Brook jumped high, again, sending the scrap of sail rustling. There was blood seeping through that one!

"B-blood!" he burst out, pointing at the arm in question. "Oh, dear! That's not good at all!" He'd meant to add that the wound needed to get washed and get new, clean bandages, but the words dwindled away in his head. The two boys were staring at him, their backs pressed towards the railing.

"Sk-sk-skeleton!" the younger boy cried out.

"Aah!" the older one exclaimed, then clamped a hand over his mouth, looking abashed. _"Shh!"_ he hissed through his fingers to the younger boy, then swerved back towards Brook, staring at him with wild eyes.

"Aah! Skeleton? Where!" cried Brook as well, spinning around, then remembered himself. "Oh, yes, you must mean me: I keep forgetting." He bowed, spinning his cane in the air. "'Dead Bones' Brook, gentlemen, at your service!" he proclaimed grandly.

The older boy said nothing now, eyes still wild, hand over mouth.

"B-but how can he move?" whispered the younger boy. "Are- are there more of them?" He looked around the ship, trembling.

"I'm afraid it's just me, young sir," said Brook. "Ah, but where are my manners? Welcome aboard!"

"Sh-shut up." The older boy had stepped closer to Brook, though his legs were shaking. He looked both frightened and angry, and was raising a fist threateningly. _Ten times stronger than humans,_ Brook reminded himself, taking an alarmed step back. "Don't talk so loud, you stupid skeleton," he hissed. "Or – or I'll kill you! There's some people after us – some _bad_ people - if they're really close, they could hear you!"

"Y-yeah!" the younger boy chimed in in a low tone, stepping up next to his friend, if just a little behind him. He glared up at Brook. "Be _quiet_."

"Ah... eh..." Brook bent down, nodded and put a finger to his lips, then rose himself up and tiptoed over to the railing, peering out through the mist and trying to listen. No sound, no sign of movement. Or was that a splashing sound from far away? He leaned forward, straining the ears he didn't have. The boys had mentioned a shark-driven boat, hadn't they? Perhaps the sound was only in his imagination. He waited for several minutes, but couldn't hear anything more. The boys didn't move, their eyes fixed on him.

Then he stalked off without another word. He got into the kitchen, ignoring the dust and cobwebs as he tore down a curtain and grabbed a bucket of rain water that had filled up days ago. Hurrying out again, he swung the bucket to and fro, possibly spilling a little water on the way.

Ah, good! They hadn't moved far, just a little while further on deck. The younger one was clutching his arm and looking paler.

"You need to clean that up, good sir," whispered Brook once he got closer, pointing at the boy. He held out the torn curtain and the bucket to the boy, who backed up looking scared and confused. Brook just stood there with the bucket in the air for a few moments, then understood and put it on the ground instead.

"It – He's right, Kili," the older boy said, tearing off a strip of the curtain and dipping it into the water. Then he took off the younger one's dirty bandages – Brook winced at seeing the wound underneath, looking away for a moment; though when he peeked back a minute later the cleaned-up wound didn't look so bad anymore. The older boy wrapped more curtain rags around the arm, making a lumpy but what looked like a serviceable bandage.

"It's just making fun of us," muttered Kili, sending another frightened glare at Brook, but he looked confused now as well. "Calling me 'sir' like that."

Brook made that little twitch around his eyes that, to him, felt like a blink, though he had no eyelids. He didn't know what to say to that – talking to people again was so difficult! – so he just took shook his head and took an uncertain step to the side, hands clasped behind his back. He started to whistle an old marching tune.

"Maybe he's just weird," said the older boy, who was still squatting down by the bucket and had started to unwind his own dirty bandage on his head. The younger boy frowned at him.

"I can do that, Red," he said, reaching out. The older boy looked like he wanted to argue, but then just sighed and rocked back on his heels, waiting patiently. Brook took a step forward, wondering if he ought to offer help again. But young Master Kili seemed to manage well enough with cleaning the small wound on the red head-fin of the older boy. Tying the bandage, though... that might be trickier. Brook clicked his tongue, twirled his cane around, finally going back there and gently taking the curtain rags away from the startled Master Kili. The older boy – Master Red, then, was it? – flinched, but stayed put with a wary look, one hand making a calming gesture to his friend.

"Careful, careful~," Brook hummed to himself as a reminder, "caaaare-ful ~ there you go!"He tied first a steady knot and then a pretty bow on it. "All ready, Master Red!" he said with a pleased grin. "Now" – remembering his duties as a host at last – "would you care for some refreshment? I can offer – let see now – some very hard sailor biscuits, left over seaweed gruel, and rather tasty tea!"

They looked rather taken aback, hunger, distrust and perhaps a certain reluctance to eat the items on offer battling on their faces. But then, the younger boy's head whipped around in direction of the stem.

"I – I heard something!" he whispered. He pointed out towards the misty sea. "Could be them – Red, we've gotta hide!"

Master Red only nodded. Brook opened his mouth, turning his head to look for a good hiding place to offer – but before he'd said anything, Master Kili had already ducked inside the nearest open doorway (the washroom, as it happened). Master Red stopped next to Brook only to whisper, quietly yet fiercely, "If you tell them we're here, I'll kill you, Mr Skeleton! Don't think I can't!" Then he hurried after Master Kili, vanishing into the same room.

"More people stopping by, then?" Brook mumbled. This all felt just a bit too unreal to truly be worrying. But he did stoop to grab his violin before strolling over towards the stem.

He wondered – _were_ they kidnappers, these pursuers, maybe even slavers? Or had he misread the situation, somehow? He wasn't completely unaware that his brain wasn't quite in tip-top working condition.

"It's not like I even have one," he told himself brightly, then had to laugh at that. Skull joke!

"OI!" came a cry from the waters. "Is there anyone up there?"

"I'm here!" Brook announced in a light tone, stepping up. The mist was even thicker by now – he could only make out a small bunch of vague, but large-ish figures in a small boat that seemed to be built for speed. And my, that _did_ look like a shark being harnessed to it, diving up and down! How clever. Whatever would people come up with next?

"Hey, pal," one of the men in the boat yelled – he was the figure who was standing up. "Have you seen two fishboys around here somewhere? Maybe they climbed aboard – they're nosy bastards like that." He put a disapproving tone into his voice, "Silly fools running away like that – they're making their guardian damn upset, y'know? Anyway, I can offer you a hefty reward! They're valu- I mean, we really want to make sure nothin' happens to them, see?"

"Oh? Is that so?" Doubts gone now, feeling light-headed but calm, Brook raised the bow and played the opening chord to "Binks' Booze". He wondered if he should go for a 'Lullaby Flan' that would hopefully put the pursuers to sleep, or jump down into the boat and put his sword to good use. The latter option appealed to him more – it was about time he did some proper practice for his sword-fighting; and it wasn't too far to jump, either. Not for him.

But the next moment, the mist cleared, and he and the men in the boat got a better look at each other. There were four of them, Brook noted, all looking quite big, tough and muscular. The one who was standing up was holding a musket, and the others were well-armed as well with guns, clubs and knives. He could see coils of rope in the boat, a big net, and a harpoon.

The very next second, the four men all started to yell and flail, upsetting their small boat.

"THAT'S A SKELETON! A GODDAMN SKE–!"

"OHSHIT OHSHIT OHSHIT–!"

"GH–GHOST SHIP!" That was the man standing up, dropping his musket. "D-don't-!"he cried out, shielding his eyes.

"H–Hey, guys!" one of them managed, "it – it might just be some kind of trick! And if those two are hiding up there..."

Brook tilted his head and put the violin aside. "A trick, did you say? Oh no, sir, I am quite real." With one smooth movement, he drew his sword and held it aloft, high above his head. "Would you care for a demonstration?"

"AAAUGHH!" came the four-stemmed cry from the boat. The man standing up grabbed the reins to the shark and pulled them hastily.

"Take the damn brats if they're there, just leave us alone, bloody ghost man!" he yelled. The shark came out of the water, made big eyes at seeing Brook, then hastily obeyed and started to pull the boat away. They soon disappeared from sight, into the mist.

Brook felt both relieved and disappointed at the lack of fight, while something inside him was shaking. He tried to tell himself the harpoon had just been there in case they'd see a fine fish specimen on the way. Yes? Still – either way it was clear they were slavers.

At this point, Brook's memory of the incident turns a lot hazier. He'd like to think that he spent some time waiting in silence for the shark-boat to get further away; he'd also like to think the two fishboys were even more careful than him, waiting longer. But he can't recall. All he remembers is being back in the middle of the deck, sitting on a barrel while the two boys are looking at him.

They didn't seem to have that same wild fear anymore, but they weren't happy and smiling either. They both gave him a look of frowning concentration, considering him. (And maybe, this is what revived the memory in the first place – the vague resemblance to Miss Liza's look just now, as she had studied his hands. Even though Miss Liza, happily, is a safe, well-fed and free child.)

"Good work, Mr Skeleton," said Master Red. "You scared 'em off." Reluctantly, he added, "Thank you."

"They probbly wouldn't have paid you anything, either," muttered Master Kili.

"Ah, well..." Brook trailed off, again not able to think of anything to say. They were all silent for a while. The boys exchanged a look with one another. Brook was just about to ask them if they had a song request for him, when Master Kili spoke up again.

"Um. Mr Skeleton," he said hesitantly, "are you..." He paused and looked down, then clenched his webbed fingers into fists and went on, "Are you human?"

"Eh?" Brook rubbed his afro in confusion. "That's an odd question... but yes, I think so!" He laughed, crossing his legs. "Or at least, I'm pretty sure I was one, before I died!"

Master Kili slumped, disappointment clear on his face. Master Red also looked glum, but then he nodded and squared his shoulders.

"That's what we thought," he said. "Sorry, Mr Skeleton. You seem pretty nice, and you helped us... but see, we just can't trust humans. It's too dangerous."

The younger boy nodded, too. "Sorry," he mumbled. "Bye."

"Eh? What? Where are you – hoy! Wait!" Brook gawked after them, reacting too slowly as the swung themselves over the railing by the port side of the stem, climbing down the seaweeds on that side – the opposite of where the slavers had sailed off. "You can't just– !" he pleaded as he reached the railing, when they were already half way off. "This is most unwise!"

Master Red just waved up at him without looking, while Master Kili didn't even do that, his hands busy with climbing. The last few metres they both jumped into the sea, disappearing under the water.

Jaw opening and shutting soundlessly, Brook just stood there, dumbstruck. His head was ringing with words he wanted to say. _But what if those people circled back and are just waiting for you? Or, or, how will you get by? You ca't drown and you can find fish to eat – but what about storms? Or seakings? What about the nameless terrors of the Florian triangle? Surely you are much too young. Won't you at least stay here and rest for a while? Please?_

Please don't leave me alone!

But it was too late. They'd gone into the mist: he could neither hear them nor see them. And it would be unwise to shout, now.

**x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x  
**  
The fragment ends there, as far as he recalls right now. He doesn't know what he did right after that. He might have tried to heat the left-over seaweed gruel, or decided to sleep for a week, or learn to play the banjolele.

The village square is empty, now – he didn't notice when Miss Liza and her grandmother left, only that they're not there now. Brook stops playing "Where the Sea Roses grow". The ballad didn't come out very well, he knows – all too absent-minded and haphazard, his fingers too numb and unsteady.

It's not just the memory itself that's shaking him, but also the plain fact that he _forgot_ it for such a long time. During the remaining dark years, he recalls now, he'd try to put the encounter out of his mind. But it would return anyway, as he'd fruitlessly try to think off what he could have said in order to make them stay; or speculate on what might have happened to the children afterwards.

Then, however, there'd been Thriller Bark and Gecko Moria, the theft of a shadow, and Brook's new desperate need to train hard every day to grow stronger. The memory of the fishboys was shoved aside, tumbling into his mind's dusty attic. And from the day he first met the Strawhats, he hasn't thought of it at all, until now.

_But,_ he thinks – can't stop himself from thinking – _if they did survive, they might have come to Fishman Island. There is at least a better chance of finding them there than anywhere else in the world._

That is a troublesome thought, vibrating inside him like a chord of hope and fear. He clutches his arms, shivering.

"Master Brook? Are you all right, sir?"

Startled, Brook flies up so hastily he upsets the tray that Miss Liza's grandmother (he can't remember her name) is carrying, tea splashing and cinnamon rolls tumbling out.

"Oh, oh! I'm fine, quite fine, dear Madam!" he assures her, helping to pick up the rolls but so agitated he drops two of them again.

"You seemed pretty out of it before, begging my pardons," she says, adjusting her skirts as she sits down. "So I told Liza to run away and play so she wouldn't bother you, then made you tea. I must say, I liked hearing you play 'The North Wind's Wedding Day'."

"Pardon me, but what did you call it?" asks Brook. "In West Blue I only knew that song as 'Where the Sea Roses grow'."

Miss Liza's grandmother arches an eyebrow. "Really? That's odd," she observes. "There's nothing about roses in it, the way we sing it."

"Of course, it's not unusual for songs to have different words on different islands," adds Brook, already curious. "Mayhaps you could sing me the other words, Madam? But not right now!" He's sipped of the tea and is busy shovelling in delicious cinnamon rolls at the moment.

"Why not," says the old woman, smiling crookedly and sitting down with him. She nabs a roll or two of her own, and they munch together for a few minutes. The shadows of the village square are tall and wide, now, the sun's light slanted and patchy. It's not long till sunset.

Brook burps gratefully and sits back, stretching out his long legs under the table. He gazes up at the evening sky. Some of his sombreness has returned – or rather, it never really went away. But the trembling, at least, has abated.

He glances at his companion. "Madam," he says impulsively, "did you know that if you lay hands on one of the World Nobles, there will be a Vice Admiral and an awful amount of other Marines sent after you to eradicate you?"

The old woman raises an eyebrow at him, then starts to stuff her pipe with tobacco leaves. "You don't say," she remarks placidly, a lady who's lived all her life on a small, isolated island. "Well, I don't know who those are, Master Brook, but I reckon if they stay out of my way I'll do my best to stay out of theirs."

Brook laughs. "That is a very good way of seeing it, Madam," he tells her. "Now, can you please tell me the words to 'The North Wind's Wedding Day'?"

As she starts to sing it – joined halfway through by two of her friends on an evening stroll, Brook follows along with his playing, pacing himself to them and trying to pick up the new lyrics. But all the while other thoughts are following with heavier feet.

"It was worth it, Captain," he mumbles, his voice drowned out by old women's laughter at the song's end. The sun has set now, and a crescent moon is shining. He remembers the battlefield: the strange cyber-Kuma, the terrifying Vice-Admiral, Master Rayleigh's help, blood and exhaustion and failure... "Yes," he repeats under his breath. "It was very much worth it."

-The End


End file.
